Chinese Family Names

Chinese family names came into being
during the clan society some 5,000 years ago.
There is more than 5,000 family names altogether,
but only 200 or so are common. Zhang, wang, Li,
Zhao and Liu are most popular family names. The
name of a person generally consists of two or
three Chinese characters, and the family name
always comes before the given name. For example,
the family name of a person called Zhang Siying
is Zhang. Chinese forms of address are more or
less the same as the Western. A man is addressed
an Xiansheng, which means Mr.- such as Mr. Lee.
An unmarried woman is addressed as Xiaojie, or
Miss. A married woman retains he maiden name and
he many be addressed as either Miss or Mrs. Plus
her name.